Why does “20 Minutes” use Anglicisms?

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Cluster, followers, webinar, crowdfunding, stalker, binge watching... For the past two years, between the Covid-19 pandemic, the generalization of teleworking and our addiction to series which has increased tenfold, our vocabulary has been particularly enriched by anglicisms.

Something to ruffle the hair of this Internet user:

“Could you stop using English terms in your articles?

The Americanization of our country is becoming unbearable!

"Carole M.

After such a request, and while the 27th Week of the French language and Francophonie, of which

is a partner, will take place soon (from March 12 to 20), we decided to look into our use of words of English and American origin in our content.

Is it excessive, inevitable?

Does it contribute to the impoverishment of the French language or, on the contrary, to its enrichment?

To answer it, we first sought to know what is meant by Anglicism, and, not being specialists in the subject, we were surprised to learn that the notion is not limited to the sole use of an English or American word.

Indeed, "we consider that there are four categories of anglicisms", indicates Florent Moncomble, lecturer in English linguistics at the University of Artois.

Four Categories of Anglicisms

“We can first cite the lexical Anglicisms, where we take the English or American term as it is, begins the linguist.

In recent jobs, there is open space, coworking, process… which are mainly found in the business world.

“Second category, he continues, “morphological Anglicisms, that is to say that we will add a prefix in -ing to a French word.

However, in English or in American, this final word does not mean much!

For example, a listing, a list, for us, in French, does not exist in English.

“These Anglicisms often come from the business world, but also from fashion,” continues the linguist.

Two or three years ago, words like souping, juicing were trendy and criticized.

But there are also morphological anglicisms that go completely unnoticed,

like shampoo, which, in English, as a reminder, is called shampoo.

»

Third category: “semantic Anglicisms, explains Florent Moncomble.

There, we take a French word, but we give it the meaning it has in English.

The most prevalent example that I immediately think of is definitely.

In French, it means forever, but we are going to give it its English meaning, which is for sure, assuredly.

Finally, the last category, that of “syntactic anglicisms, specifies the linguist.

We borrow from English turns of phrase which, a priori, do not exist in French.

For example, the last twenty-four hours, which is the translation of "the last twenty-four hours", a phrase that comes from the journalistic world.

In French, we're supposed to have the numeral before the adjective, so we should say the last twenty-four hours.

»

Speak the same language as their readership

That being said, now is the time for self-criticism: yes, at

, there are sections in which anglicisms are used and abused.

Culture journalist, Anne Demoulin admits to using it a lot in her articles on the series: “English expressions are used more by fans of series, fed to American series, she analyzes.

So writing show, guilty pleasure, guest, teaser… is a way of speaking the same language as your readership, and therefore not destabilizing it.

It's also a way to avoid repetition, she says: “Using show allows me not to repeat the word series 36 times in the same article.

But let's be honest, you can type on many other headings.

At the very beginning of the Covid-19 epidemic, the term cluster made a sensational entry into our daily lives.

So much so that we dedicated a whole topic to it.

It was quickly translated by outbreak, and is now widely used in its French form.

Why then prefer to borrow from the English language when the language of Molière is so rich?

By impossibility, by laziness?

“I don't believe in untranslatability, we always manage to find words or circumlocutions,” says Florent Moncomble.

In case of difficulty in translating an English word, there is also the France Terme database, which includes all the French equivalents published in the Official Journal by the General Commission of Terminology and Neology of the French Academy.

The lecturer concedes, however, that “ease or a fashion effect will lead to the use of Anglicisms.

And when these modes pass, the word also disappears.

Look, today, we no longer use the term dancing, which evolved into a nightclub, then a discotheque.

»

In the eyes of the linguist, “only time will tell if these words will remain in the language as they are, translated or adapted.

Recently, instead of webinar, I see webinar, there is already a partial translation effort.

In the computer field, curiously, there is resistance to Anglicisms: the word download is used much more than the word uploader, software rather than software.

Conversely, nowadays, who would dispute the word parking, or weekend, both in the dictionary?

Thirty years of questions

The debate over anglicisms is not new.

Almost thirty years ago, the law of August 4, 1994 on the use of the French language, commonly known as the “Toubon Law”, came into force.

It provided for "[his] use in the various circumstances of social life such as work, consumption, advertising, the media, public services, teaching and research", recalled in 2014 the former Minister of Culture and Francophonie Jaques Toubon.

Today, who would complain about the fact that it "requires any employer established on French territory (…) to conclude an employment contract in French or to translate it" or that it "requires the manufacturer of an electrical appliance to translate the instructions”?

Recently, the French Academy adopted a report denouncing the confusion due to the abundance of Anglicisms in institutional communication (public institutions, agencies, local authorities, public or private companies).

With, ultimately, risks such as “an impoverishment of the French lexicon and growing discrimination between audiences”, certain terms being more or less easy to understand (start-up versus bleisure, portmanteau between business and leisure).

The six academicians who authored the report also deplore that “the syntax is disrupted, which constitutes a real attack on the language”.

But is French really in danger?

“A language that has stopped borrowing is a dead language”

“Borrowing from a foreign language is part of life, of the evolution of any language,” explains Florent Moncomble.

I would also say that a language which has ceased to borrow is a language which has ceased to evolve, which is dead.

English itself has borrowed heavily from French.

According to the experts that

has been able to question over the years, 30% to 40%, even 67% of English words come from French.

And the examples are legion: butler comes from bottler, foreign, fairground, people, people, etc.

Our media brief

For Florent Moncomble, “behind this rejection of Anglicisms hides the fear of a change in civilization, way of life, vision of the world”.

A fear shared by the reader who challenged us.

“Except that we tend to forget that the United Kingdom was the cradle of trade unionism, the right to strike and other social advances, underlines the linguist.

In my opinion, the English language does not prohibit social reflection and is not synonymous with capitalism or unbridled liberalism.

»

According to the latest synthesis of the Observatoire de la francophonie (2018), French was, in the world, the 5th most spoken language, the second most learned foreign language

the 4th language on the Internet.

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